CHEYENNE - A federal trial began Tuesday in the case of an intersexual person who says she was unfairly kept in solitary confinement at the Wyoming Women's Center in Lusk.

Miki Ann Dimarco, 44, of Douglas, was imprisoned for violating the terms of her parole on check-fraud charges. She says she spent all of her 14-month sentence four years ago in solitary confinement.

At issue in the case before U.S. District Judge Clarence Brimmer is whether that was cruel and unusual or whether prison officials were right to separate Dimarco to protect her.

The non-jury trial is expected to wrap up before midday Friday.

Dimarco's attorney, Tom Sedar of Casper, said Dimarco, just before she was sent to Lusk, was kept with the female population of the Albany County jail without problems. But he said state prison officials seemed concerned from the start about what to do with her.

He described how Dimarco was strip-searched when she was processed into the Wyoming Women's Center. "They say, 'Turn around, we want to see what's going on here.' Which is very, very embarrassing for her," he said.

According to Sedar, Dimarco was put in solitary confinement even though she was not considered a threat to others. "They rated her the very lowest they could rate her as far as her being a risk to the community up there," he said.

Besides keeping her away from others, the solitary confinement meant Dimarco could be outside her cell just 5.5 hours a day and could not have a variety of personal items - even a watch or clock.

"Five hundred, 1,000 years ago, when Christ was walking the earth, at least lepers were treated better than that," Sedar said. "She was being treated worse than a leper."

He said guards noted frequently that Dimarco seemed depressed.

Dimarco sexually identifies herself as female. She has female hair patterns and breasts but underdeveloped male reproductive organs. She has no female reproductive organs, according to psychologist Martha Schilling, the first witness to take the stand.

Dimarco is not considered a hermaphrodite, which is a person who has both male and female reproductive organs.

Schilling also said that Dimarco's No. 23 chromosome pair is XY, the pattern for a male. The female pattern is XX.

In the prosecution's opening statements, Senior Assistant Attorney General Craig Kirkwood referred to a lawsuit filed by an inmate at the Wyoming State Penitentiary - the men's prison in Rawlins - who claimed he was not adequately protected from inmates who eventually attacked him.

"This case … ultimately will be about, can the Department of Corrections do anything right?" Kirkwood said.

Kirkwood mentioned that Dimarco has provided seven Social Security numbers to authorities, none of which has checked out. "The testimony is going to reveal that … to this day they don't know who this individual is," he said.

He pointed out that 75-90 percent of inmates at the Wyoming Women's Center have been abused by men at some point and said those inmates were considered a potential threat to Dimarco.

"What is this institution supposed to do because they have a male … because he managed to fool a district judge," he said.

Kirkwood disputed the Dimarco's claim she was kept in solitary confinement, characterizing it instead as "close restrictive."

"We could keep her in the Women's Center, we could keep her in the men's center, or we could keep her in the Women's Center under conditions that she didn't particularly like but kept her safe," he said.

Dimarco has short-cropped, white hair. She wore a white blouse, gray vest, gray skirt, jewelry and glasses.